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PROPELLER LOADING DISTRIBUTIONS

Improvements are reported in the numerical procedure for evaluating propeller loading distributions which has been developed at Davidson Laboratory by adaptation of the unsteady-lifting-surface theory. A new approach, based on the fact that the assumed Birnbaum chordwise modes are not linearly independent has achieved stability for the chordwise distribution, which had otherwise shown no sign of convergence with increasing number of modes. Other refinements of the numerical program, including provision for arbitrary blade camber variation and overlapping of blade wakes have improved the accuracy of both chordwise and spanwise loading distribution and brought the theoretical results closer to experiment.